This is the space to tell us how you would answer the writing prompt that appears in CrimeBits on page 163.
It’s happening again.
I keep hearing them. Scratching behind the skirtingboard. I know they’re there. No one else believes me though. They say it’s all in my head. I know I’m right though. That’s all that matters. Mum came round to visit. She brought some food with her, but I can’t eat it. Don’t know what’s in it. I need to check everything again. No tins, no frozen foods. Fresh meat, fresh veg. Even that is risky.
Brush teeth for one minute. Wash hands three times. Face twice. Repeat once. Keeps them away for a few hours.
It’s been over a year since I’d heard them. They were just waiting for me to feel a little normal for a while. They know when to come back.
I’ve heard the clicks on the phone. They’re listening to my conversations so I can’t even tell Mum about them.
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It’s time for bed, so I put an old CD of white noise into an alarm clock with a built in CD player and AM/FM radio. Technically it was a CD-R, the original CD I bought was quickly ripped onto my computer (offline) and checked for metadata. Even older music CDs can contain metadata so that the song titles appear on your car CD player. It is my personal belief that they can contain messages, threats, demands. Maybe even incantations. So I always burn then on a CD-R without any metadata before I even think about playing them in any device. Of course, the alarm clock itself is modified, too. I stripped the radio antenna so they can’t contact me across the airwaves.
I pause before closing the lid. I pop the CD back out, and bend over, one eye slammed shut so that I can peer into the tiny lens that reads the discs with the other eye. It doesn’t appear to have been replaced with a camera since I checked last night. I pull back the blankets and freeze.
I didn’t throw away the food Mum brought.
It’s still in the kitchen. It needs to be outside, in the dumpster. But not in my dumpster- the one the next building over in case they come to retrieve the bug no doubt hidden in the food. A rock forms in my throat. I drop the blanket and make briskly for the kitchen. I ignore what I think is a scratcher starting back up for the night, and snatch the plastic bag, glide to the door, and slip on my sandals. Looking out the peephole I see the coast is clear and proceed on my mission. As I jogged down the steps and pushed past the door to my building, a cool wind rattled the plastic bag swinging like a pendulum from my knuckles. It occurred to me too late I should have checked the contents. What if Mum had been carjacked, forced to drive over at gunpoint, and the assailant had slipped a note in the food bag with a ransom demand for me to save her life?
I look down at the bag in consideration. Well, if they did have her that would no doubt be a trap. I scurry towards the next building’s dumpster, thinking ‘Nice try,’ and sling the bag of food in. A thoughtful parcel of lovingly curated food from the woman who brought me into this world rebounds off the dumpster lid and into the garbage. I stare at the outside of my building on my way back, biting the inside of one cheek as I imagine them on the other side of that brick, inside my walls. Moving left to right to left like crabs. Scratching. Huffing, I ascend the stairs, slip inside my room, deadbolt, pinch & twist doorknob lock, both chains. I hum loudly on my way in to hopefully drown out any scratching. My heart sinks when I see the plastic bag of food from Mum back on the kitchen counter.